Digital media had another banner year in 2013, and some of this year’s trends may provide some clues as to what may lay ahead next year. As more Web users shift to mobile and tablet screens, Web activity using computer browsers declined slightly among the top 10 websites. Online video viewing, however, continued to grow, and YouTube remained the top source for streaming, as 128 million Americans viewed video content on the site each month.

Smartphone penetration grew from 56 percent at the start of 2013 to nearly two-thirds (65%) of U.S. mobile subscribers by October 2013, and a majority of subscribers used Android (52%) or iOS (41%) smartphones. Along with growing ownership came increased activity using smartphone apps: Facebook remained the most-used smartphone app across Android and iOS handsets, with more than 103 million unique users each month. Among the top 10 apps, Instagram was up 66 percent in terms of unique users, making it the fastest growing app over the past year.

Top 10 U.S. Web Brands for 2013

Rank

Web Brand

Avg Unique Audience

YoY % Change

1

Google

164,805,000

-6%

2

Facebook

134,943,000

-16%

3

Yahoo

129,801,000

-9%

4

MSN/WindowsLive/Bing

121,031,000

-2%

5

YouTube

119,242,000

-14%

6

Microsoft

83,039,000

-6%

7

AOL Media Network

81,037,000

-7%

8

Amazon

79,673,000

-1%

9

Wikipedia

72,591,000

-6%

10

Ask Search Network

64,249,000

-18%

Data from January 2013 – October 2013 (Total). Ranked on average monthly unique audience.
Read as: During 2013, 164.8 million unique U.S. people, on average, visited Google each month.
Source: Nielsen.

Top 10 U.S. Online Video Brands of 2013

Rank

Site

Avg Unique Viewers

YoY % Change

1

YouTube

128,436,000

-6%

2

VEVO

37,209,000

-9%

3

Yahoo

35,412,000

-8%

4

AOL Media Network

26,448,000

5%

5

MSN/WindowsLive/Bing

19,784,000

6%

6

The CollegeHumor Network

18,351,000

-6%

7

Perform Group

15,978,000

58%

8

Hulu

13,117,000

-2%

9

ESPN Digital Network

12,644,000

4%

10

Netflix

11,946,000

1%

Data from January – October 2013 (Total). Ranked on average monthly unique viewers.
Read as: During 2013, 128 million unique U.S. people, on average, streamed video from YouTube each month.
Source: Nielsen.

Top Smartphone Apps of 2013

Rank

App

Avg Unique Users

YoY % Change

1

Facebook

103,420,000

27%

2

Google Search

75,984,000

37%

3

Google Play

73,667,000

28%

4

YouTube

71,962,000

27%

5

Google Maps

68,580,000

14%

6

Gmail

64,408,000

29%

7

Instagram

31,992,000

66%

8

Maps(Apple)

31,891,000

64%

9

Stocks

30,781,000

32%

10

Twitter

30,760,000

36%

Data from January – October 2013, among smartphone owners 18+ (iOS and Android only). Ranked by average monthly unique users.
Read as: During 2013 103 million smartphone owners used the Google Search app on average each month.
Source: Nielsen.